Worlds Within Worlds...

A blog about comics, yo-yos, anime, juggling, movies, music, esperanto, and any of my other eclectic hobbies...

Monday, January 19, 2004

New CPM manga...

This article I find kind of interesting actually. It lists two new titles coming down the road from CPM: Comic Party and Treasure Hunter. Why is it significant? Just because of the two titles themselves.

Comic Party deals with doujinshi, which is the term for amateur comics in Japan, generally sold through conventions or the internet. Some of it is original, but a large amount is stories using characters from popular manga, aka fanfiction. The article implies that all of it is sexual and that definitely isn't true. However, quite a lot of it is. But the companies in Japan allow it since it because many good creators come out of the doujinshi scene and a lot of commercial creators feel like it is a form of flattery. CLAMP is an example of creators who started as a doujinshi circle and later went commercial.

Anyway, Comic Party is about some kids who end up attempting to make their own comic. When you think about it, this would be like a comic about some people making a minicomic. Except the irony is that this comic is commercial and even was animated! It is pretty cool that the US industry is starting to get diverse enough to support the odder entries, like this one.

The other is Treasure Hunter, and is a comic I have never heard of before. Is it good? Who knows... the reason I bring it up is more to illustrate the point of name-power for creators. Alien Nine was an off-beat but popular title for CPM, and now they're bringing out another comic he did. Notice how big his name is on the cover. There is no anime or video games or CCGs for this title out there, it is just going on the name. There's also the fact that almost every comic CLAMP has produced is currently out or licensed, and many other examples. Some people have tried to argue that there might not be so much fan loyalty in the bookstore market, but I'd argue the opposite is true. With novels, people are used to focusing on the writer and seeing if there's other stuff they've written that they might enjoy. Seems like manga is following the same path for the most part...